Subway hustler racks up 141st, 142nd busts

Serial subway crime offender Charles Barry was busted Wednesday for allegedly scamming two Brazilian tourists out of $25 — and was promptly nailed for another earlier case, bringing his notorious arrest total to 142, police said.

In the latest case, Barry, 56, was arrested at 12:30 p.m. in the Times Square station after cops saw him take $25 from two Brazilian tourists, then hand the pair a MetroCard that had no value on it.

Police said the empty-card trick is a familiar one for Barry (photo), who in the past has pretended to be a transit worker who tells unsuspecting victims that the MetroCard machine is broken.

Barry was also wanted for scamming the same amount last Saturday from a Texas woman in a wheelchair, police said.

In that case, his 142nd arrest, the disabled woman he allegedly ripped off was visiting the city with her cop husband who was shot and wounded in the 2016 Dallas ambush in which five officers were killed and eight others wounded.

“I want to sell my story to the Daily News. It’s a false arrest,” Barry told a News reporter Wednesday. “They are targeting me because of the bail reform.”

“They release me again and again. … They are targeting me. I am going to sell my story to you.”

Barry, talking with officers on each side of him, declared: “It’s about bail reform. I am the poster boy. I’ll sell my story to you when I get out.”

“I’ll be out tomorrow. Because of the bail reform law, that’s why.”

The NYPD says Barry’s case highlights what is wrong with bail reform, with judges not able to keep behind bars the career criminals who commit the same crimes over and over.

The Legal Aid Society, which represents Barry, and other advocates argue police are fearmongering, highlighting a few recidivists while ignoring the benefits of bail reform and other changes that took effect Jan. 1. Those reforms, advocates say, give people accused of crimes the ability to stay in school or return to work while their cases are pending.

“Mr. Barry’s case underscores the need for economic stability and meaningful social services, not a need to roll back bail reform,” said Legal Aid spokesman Redmond Haskins. “Locking up Mr. Barry on unaffordable bail or worse, remanding without bail, ultimately does nothing to protect the public and fails entirely to address his actual needs.”